


Now I'm Taking You Home

by Krasimer



Series: Stay In Your Court (Bring You Home) [2]
Category: Outlast (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Cute, Fluff, Happy Ending, Little bit of a hospital, M/M, Mentions of Panda the border collie, mentions of canon-typical violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-05
Updated: 2016-03-05
Packaged: 2018-05-24 20:40:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6166060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Krasimer/pseuds/Krasimer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chris comes home.</p><p>Miles brings him back to who he was.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Now I'm Taking You Home

"You're going to have to be careful these next few days," came a soft voice from one side of him. "His healing process is going to be long and complicated."

Miles' jaw clenched tightly for a second as he stared through the window to where Chris lay in a bed, sedated into sleep. His face was calm, and now that he wasn't blood splattered, he looked a little more like the man Miles remembered. "I know that." he swallowed nervously, turning to the doctor next to him. "Don't restrain him. I mean..." he sighed, then pressed his forehead to the glass. "He just came out of the mess Murkoff created."

"I-" the doctor made a horrified sound, one hand coming up to cover her mouth. "I've been dealing with a couple of the patients who were removed from there. I knew it was bad, but..."

"It is," Miles grumbled under his breath for a moment. "It is so much worse than 'bad'. You should have seen how they were forcing them to live. There's no fucking way that place got that awful in the time between the start of the riots and the end of them." his hands clenched tight, knuckles bloodless notches of bone almost poking through skin. "They left them to rot in what were pretty much cages."

The doctor paled, her eyes wide as she looked between Miles and the unconscious man in the other room. "So he-"

"They tied him up with chains so he couldn't break out of them." Miles hissed, eyes narrowed. "The scarring on his wrists is from that." he turned back to her, took a deep breath, then nodded slowly. "Don't restrain him. If he wakes up panicking, get me in there. If he sees a person in a doctor's outfit while he's in panic mode, I don't know how he'll react."

"...I'm just going to list you as his spouse, if that's alright with you." she held up her clipboard, her hand shaking gently. "I don't know how you know him, but you seem to have-"

"He was my partner. I don't know if that still holds true now that Murkoff ripped into his brain, but he was my partner and I had just moved into his apartment with him and his dog when he vanished." Miles nodded, then forced himself to swallow down his anger. "So yeah, if you could make it so that I have visitation rights, that'd be great."

She nodded, taking a steadying breath before offering a hand out to him. "My name is Sarah Kinelli, I'm the attending physician for Mister Walker and the others coming out of Mount Massive. If any of the nurses give you trouble, just tell them to talk to me, alright?"

"I..." Miles went back to staring at Chris. "Thank you."

 

XxXxX

 

Waking up was painful.

Every inch of him hurt, joints were sore, muscles ached, it felt like he hadn't actually slept in a long time, even though he knew he was just approaching consciousness now. His throat felt thrashed, like he'd spent hours and hours screaming.

If it weren't for the softness supporting him and the layer of warmth over the top of him, Chris would have thought that he was finally dying.

The other thing that convinced him that he wasn't was the small patch of warmth resting against his arm. Slowly opening his eyes, Chris grunted as he looked down, spotting a wild mass of dark hair on top of an expanse of tanned skin. The man at his side looked exhausted, dark circles under his eyes and the slow breathing of the deeply-asleep making him seem even smaller than he actually was. 

Miles.

His name was Miles.

Last name Upshur, first name Miles, middle name Howell. Thirty-three years old, if he accounted for the time since they had last spoken. 

A video chat, long distance.

...Something about dog treats. That was important. A black and white dog named 'Panda', and something about dog treats.

"Mister Walker?" came a gentle voice from somewhere beyond his current range of sight. Looking up revealed a small woman in a doctor's jacket, worry in her eyes as she watched him, one hand still on the door. "Is everything alright?"

Opening his mouth seemed impossible, his lips dry and cracking, but he managed to speak. "Shifting memories...Water?"

She nodded, coming slowly closer and bee-lining for his bedside table, pouring a cup for him. "Do you know where you are right now, has anyone told you that?" she held it out to him, helping to curl his fingers around it. Gripping it tight enough to hold it but loose enough not to crush it felt alien, unusual and almost unwelcome when it came to the brief flashes of memory that followed. 

"Hospital." he grunted out, taking small sips, ignoring the urge to chug it down. 

Survival. Limited supplies, hot desert days and conservation of the water because who knew when clean would be available again?

Focus.

Warmth, yes.

Desert heat, no.

Supposed to be safe here. There was supposed to be safe too.

"That's right, Mister Walker. My name is Sarah Kinelli." she offered the jug of water again when his cup was empty, pouring more when he nodded. "I'm one of the people trying to help you, alright?"

Wrists felt too light. "Yes."

"You've been unconscious for nearly two weeks now, we've had to do a couple of procedures to make it so that you would be near functional when you woke up." she pulled a small flashlight out of her pocket. "I'm just going to check your eyes now, alright? Tell me if the light hurts, or if there is any sort of anomaly with your vision."

He winced when it hit his eyes, but stilled when no other pain followed. 

"Miles?"

Sarah 'hmm'd', checking both eyes briefly. "Mister Upshur has been in here at every possible moment, trying to make sure that you were alright. I'm guessing he finally got tired and used your bed as a pillow." she smiled. "We gave him a cot to use, but he's explained some of the reasons he doesn't want to leave you alone, so I don't blame him."

With an unsure gesture, Chris allowed one of his hands to settle on top of Miles' head, the man's hair somewhat soft under his fingers. It tickled his palm, and a small smile went across his face. 

Apartments and dogs and video calls.

Important things.

He shook away the sense memory of attacking, of trying to contain a threat that wasn't there anymore. "Let him sleep." he grated out, "Needs it. Cot?"

With a gesture of one hand off to the side, Sarah nodded. "Yes sir, just over there. Call for a nurse if he needs help putting it together when he wakes up. Or if you need anything else." she smiled again. "I'm going to go now, but I'll send someone your way so that food can be arranged."

Chris nodded, still petting at the smaller man's hair, watched as she walked away. 

Left in the room with just himself and Miles, Chris blinked slowly, trying to focus on the reddened skin he could see on his nose. His hands were busied with petting over Miles' hair and shoulders, unable to be willed away from the more enjoyable task to investigate himself further.

"Mhmm..." came the soft noise.

Familiar softness.

Memories that were seemingly ages old floated to the surface, hazy with time and damage. A flash of a sunny day, a smile on a familiar face. A warmbrown jacket, slick under his fingers as he tugged him closer. 

Choking grips around throats, people gurgling as they spluttered. 

Blood spraying across his skin, heads collected on a shelf.

There was something else, some-

Chris shuddered, forcing his eyes open as he stared at a spot on the wall, listening only to the breathing of the man next to him and the beeping of the machinery. Miles was there, Miles was safe. If he remembered anything else, he knew he would always remember the smaller man as a safe thing, a sanctuary in the mess that had been left in his mind.

Flurries of white, coldnumb fingers and rose-colored cheeks and darklight, hair speckled with snow.

A kiss under a porch light, warmth between.

"...Chris?"

He looked down, his hands going still. 

Miles sat up slowly, wincing when his neck moved. "Hey," he said softly, scrubbing a hand down his face. "You're awake. Look at that."

"Thinking." Chris muttered. "Sleep?"

"Think I've slept enough for a long time." Miles met Chris's eyes, then searched over his face. "How are you doing? You've been out of it for a long time, and I don't think you got much sleep- I mean..."

"Not much good there." Chris grated out, feeling the scratch of his voice in his throat. "Best thing was finding you."

With a small noise in the back of his throat, Miles' face practically exploded into a flush of pink. "I was watching every step of the way the last couple of weeks. I made sure that anything they did to you was run by me first. I had people explaining everything to me." his hands curled into the thin blankets, knuckles going white. "I- Chris, you-"

He swallowed. "I missed you, so much."

Head tipped back, mouth open in a soft gape, eyes almost rolling back in his head as his heat surrounds you-

Cold emptiness in the pit of your stomach as someone dressed like a doctor raises a syringe and needle with an off-puttingly colored liquid in it.

Panda, barking excitedly as you put her in your truck for the first time, bringing her home to a place she's never been before.

Chris tilted his head to one side, taking a deep breath before sliding his hand over both of Miles', running a careful finger over the bloodless knuckles. "I missed you." he rasped out, his eyes still somewhat odd looking as he focused on the smaller man's face. "Missed you, missed Panda, missed...Everything."

"Doctors were saying that you might not wake up, and that you-" Miles nudged his head against Chris's arm, leaving his face pressed against the skin there. "Don't you ever fucking scare me like that again, alright?"

A gentle knock on the door startled both of them. "Menus are here, if you want them." said the nurse, holding them up. "I was also told to come and help set up that cot, if that was necessary."

Both of them nodded, separating quickly. 

 

XxXxX

 

Another week passed before Chris was discharged from the hospital, Miles at his side the entire time.

The air between them was awkward, filled with moments of acting like they had been before and moments of being total strangers to one another. There would be a second of Chris acting like Miles remembered, the big burly teddy bear soldier, and then he would shut down and seem like a watered down version of the one-man mission from the asylum. He would go to hold the larger man's hand and pull away suddenly, neither of them in a good place to continue a relationship that had been abandoned for a year.

Going home was an entirely different ordeal.

Pulling up to the apartment building, Miles frowned at how they were situated. Chris in the passenger seat with Miles driving had never really happened before. Usually, it had been Chris driving, the radio playing quietly in the background with some country or some random thing he had decided he liked. 

It had never really been attached to who was more dominant, but usually Miles being elbow deep in some report or another for a story he was writing.

Shutting off the engine, Miles turned to Chris, carefully putting a hand on his shoulder. "We're here." he said quietly. "Do you want to go up? Do you want me to stay down here? I can go find some place else to stay for the night. It's up to you, I don't kno-"

"Miles." Chris said gently, his eyes focusing on Miles' face. He fell silent, turning to pin his gaze on the steering wheel. 

"I just want you to be comfortable." he whispered. "And I don't know how to...How to make that happen. Everything feels weird, and I just..."

Chris turned to look at him, then reached across the divide to take Miles' hand. "You make everything better." he swallowed, the movement of his throat drawing the smaller man's gaze. "You always have. I think I- I know I missed you the most, out of everything they took away from me. I don't really remember my thoughts when I was wandering around the asylum, and I don't want to." he cleared his throat this time, voice still a little wrecked. "I remember nearly killing one of the doctors once because he said something about finding anyone I had a relationship with. They wanted to see if some of what I was doing was environmental, if someone else living in the same sort of situation as my home life would have the same reactions."

He shrugged. "I knew it meant you, even if I didn't really remember you at that moment. I broke a table and three chairs before they got me restrained again."

"Heh." Miles grinned at that. "Fuckers deserved worse."

"Please," Chris's eyes were soft, and he motioned up the stairs towards where his apartment was. "Come home with me. You've already gotten me this far, just a little further until the horrible part is over. I asked you to move in with me, and I still want the life that offers." he made a face. "It might require more patience, and that's a lot to ask from you, I know. I can't say I'll be the same as I was, but I can try."

Taking his hand and dropping his cheek into the palm of it, Miles nodded. "Just don't expect Panda to come rushing to the door to greet us. I boarded her in a kennel so I could go deal with Mount Massive."

"...Can we go get her tomorrow?"

With a snort of laughter, Miles nodded again. "Yeah, we can go get your furry little baby tomorrow. I missed her too, and I've seen her practically every day since you got deployed last. You haven't seen her in over a year, not in person. You deserve some time."

Unbuckling, Chris got out of the car, coming around to Miles' side and opening the door. "Time to go home?"

"Time to go home." Miles took his hand again, locking up the car in one practiced motion before heading for the stairs. "I think there might actually be food still in the house. Kind of got in the habit of freezing meals."

"Good." Chris muttered. "You worried me sometimes, never remembering to eat when you were working."

The tension had dissolved entirely, a sort of comfort and familiarity settling back in between them.

**Author's Note:**

> And that does it for this series! I just wanted it to be a tiny little fluff series, and I think I accomplished that. If you have any questions about anything in it, you can message me on my tumblr: LookUponMyWorksYeMighty or Krasimer !
> 
> Tell me what you liked, disliked, you know the drill, in the comments and tell me what you thought!
> 
> Have a wonderful moment of distracting yourself with fiction :D


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